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The Newbies Arena Are you new to knife making? Here is all the help you will need.

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  #1  
Old 10-10-2008, 07:30 PM
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Shankmaker Shankmaker is offline
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Sharpeners?

I did have the edge on my knife I made hair poppen sharp.
Well I kept jacken with it and the edge is gone and I cant get it back like it was.
I get it somewhat sharp but being a "Wanna be knifemaker " thats unacceptable.
At the rate im going I wont have any steel left to sharpen.
Im doing a basic flat grind now with my little belt sander so I wouldnt think it would be to hard to get the edge sharp.
I have the lansky sharpener but it boogers up the polished finish.

I have tried the slack belt method with little success.
I never have been able to use a stone worth a crap.

Is there a sharpener you guys would recommend until I get this down?


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  #2  
Old 10-10-2008, 07:53 PM
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TexasJack TexasJack is offline
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There have been some long discussions on here about sharpening, and you might want to do a search for some of them.

The most important part of sharpening is practice. You need to get a very consistent edge and that takes some time to develop.

Woodworkers are pretty keen (ouch, a pun!) on using the 'scary sharp' method for their cutting tools. It's simple, cheap, and gets to the point. (ouch, again!)

Use sandpaper on a very smooth surface. Some people use a piece of glass and tape it down. Put on a little oil for lubricant and then start working the edge. Start with a grit that is close to your finish - maybe 200 or 400 grit. Then move up to whatever level you want - 800, 1200, etc. It cuts very fast.

I read a piece on sharpening years ago in a hunting magazine. The author suggested that before you sharpen your own prize knife, you get a bunch of knives from the kitchen and sharpen them for practice. Chances are they are dull and anything you do will be an improvement.

Most sharpening techniques leave the knife with a wire edge. It will feel razor sharp, but that edge is so thin it will fold over and not cut at all. Stropping on a piece of leather can remove that wire edge and leave an edge that will continue to cut.


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  #3  
Old 10-10-2008, 10:04 PM
AcridSaint AcridSaint is offline
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If you want a sharpening system, stick with the lansky, if you want to do it without a system then you'll need to practice much more. I sharpen on a wheel or slack belt followed by a buffer. I also completely agree with sharpening everything you have in the kitchen. Then go back a week later and do the dull ones again

Around here you can buy flimsy kitchen knives at church 2nd hand stores or goodwill and the like for 50 cents each or so. If you really want scrap knives, you could start there.


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  #4  
Old 10-10-2008, 11:43 PM
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chiger chiger is offline
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Man...you've opened a can of worms Shank. Talk to 20 makers and you'll get 20 methods.

The guys are right about the kitchen knives practice. Most households have a drawer with old knives stuffed in the back because they're to dull to use. Practice on them.

Personally, I only use stone for the final edge. The harder/finer the better, but good ones can be expensive. It is a lot slower and it takes a lot of practice. On the up side and unlike powered mechanical process, one slip doesn't wreck the edge.

Here are a couple principals that apply to all methods. 1. How sharp a knife is (how much resistance the edge generates during cutting) , is a function of how shallow the sharpening angle is. 2. How durable the edge is (how resistant the edge is to chipping or rolling), is a function of how steep the angle is. 3. Regardless of the angle, the edge will be more durable the finer in microns the sharpening media is. Coarse grits will produce edges that feel sharp, but will not last.

What ever way you decide to sharpen, keep those 3 things in mind and find a combination that works for you. Then stick with it till it becomes second nature.

Good luck. You'll get it. It just takes persistence.

chiger,
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  #5  
Old 10-11-2008, 07:59 AM
RICK LOWE RICK LOWE is offline
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The Lansky system is pretty reliable to get a sharp even angle on the blade. If the clamp is leaving marks on the mirror finish, put a small piece of soft leather under the clamp jaws. Works for me on etched blades.
Rick


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  #6  
Old 10-11-2008, 09:35 AM
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Ray Rogers Ray Rogers is offline
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To answer your question about powered sharpeners, I like the Chef's Choice EC-120 or the newer EC-130. They produce a remarkable good edge for an electric sharpener and they don't remove much metal. Also, you'd have to be a complete and utter clutz to really screw up a blade with one. But, they aren't made to create an edge on a knife that's never been sharpened - you must sharpen the knife first and then use the sharpener to improve the not quite sharp edge.

All that being the case about electric sharpeners, I would still suggest you follow the advice you've already been given and practice. The electric sharpener will improve the edge you have now because it forces you to hold the blade at a consistent angle and that's the only reason. The Lansky will do that as well, and practice will help you do that with belts, stones, or any other method.

When I have put the final finish on my blade I then cover it with blue masking tape to protect it while I work on the handle. When the knife is finished, I take it to the grinder and put an edge on it right through the tape, Only after the edge is finished does the tape come off. The same method will work with the Lansky or even an electric sharpener.

I cheat a little on the angle when I do it. Instead of holding the blade at, say, 20 degrees to the platen I first set the platen at 20 degrees to the tool rest, then remove the tool rest. Put the edge against the platen but hold the knife perpendicular to the floor, it's easier to judge by eye that you are holding perpendicular to the floor than it is to try to hold the blade at 20 degrees to the platen. As I said before, holding the blade at a consistent angle is the secret to producing the edge you want...


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  #7  
Old 10-11-2008, 05:42 PM
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Shankmaker Shankmaker is offline
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Thanks for the replies.
I was trying the slack belt method today and burnt the tip off my knife a couple times.
My blade is alot smaller now then it was.

What about the paper wheels I have heard people talking about?I tried to look up some info on them but didnt come up with much.

I did put some tape on the Lansky to keep it from marking up my finish. Thanks for that tip.Im getting the edge real close but just cant seem to get it to the "scarey" level.

I will keep after it but I was ready to throw the towel in today out of frustration.


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  #8  
Old 10-11-2008, 06:11 PM
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Ray Rogers Ray Rogers is offline
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What about the paper wheels? All of the above still applies. They work fine just as any of the other systems and methods do if you can hold the angle rock steady and all the other things that were covered above. There's no magic answer, it boils down to practice, practice, practice with whatever system you decide to use. Sharp is sharp no matter how you get it and they'll all get you there if you master them.

As for the tape, don't put it on the Lansky, put it on your blade and keep it there until the knife is finished. There's not much that's worse than getting that blade razor sharp and then noticing that the last bit of buffing compound, or stone, or grit from the paper wheel put a scratch on your blade....


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  #9  
Old 10-11-2008, 10:35 PM
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NJStricker NJStricker is offline
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Shankmaker,

One thing you should do is educate yourself about the different types of edge geometries, especially the relationships between the primary and secondary bevels. Here's some reading to get you started: http://www.knifeart.com/bladgeomfaqb.html

Are you trying to achieve a flat grind or convex grind? Flat grind with convex edge? Flat grind to zero edge? sabre grind (currently popular on scandi bushcraft blades)?

The Youtube videos that show sharpening on a slack belt sander are basically showing one quick way to achieve a convexed edge. What they don't usually tell you, and which you've already discovered, is that you can overheat a blade and either ruin the temper or grind away a lot more metal than you need to to achieve a working sharpness. I've seen those videos. There are a couple of guys that know what they are doing (J. Neilson is one) and then there are others that are just grinding metal off of their blade.

Depending on which forum you're on and which part-time makers and their groupies you listen to, you'll get different opinions about which is the "correct" geometry. The European sites that follow the writings of Mors Koschanski and Ray Mears will try and tell you that the best grind is a sabre grind (which is now popularly referred to as a scandi grind--I bet many of the groupies don't know the name sabre grind). Another set of forums will have members that swear up and down that anything other than a full convex grind with no secondary bevel is better than anything else. Only problem is, that's one of the tougher grinds to get right, and if you don't know how to sharpen it properly, one that can cause a lot of frustration to the user.

Before hollow grinds on thick bars of steel became fashionable, the grind on most American working knives--at least those that were commercially produced--was a flat grind (primary grind) on thin stock (1/8 inch or less) tapering down to a very short sabre grind (secondary grind, or sharpened edge) of about 17 degrees. My 1920's era Marbles Ideal (a drop point) is about 1/8 inch thick. My Western and Union Cutlery fixed-blade hunters from the 1930's were ground from 3/32 inch stock. The 4-inch blade on my Western folder is 1/16 inch thick. Since the stock and the primary bevel were thin, it didn't take a lot of work to put the edge on those blades because the secondary bevel was not very high--it was often nothing more than a thin silver line. And it didn't take much to keep the edge on those old high-carbon simple alloy steels. A few swipes with a hard Arkansas stone was all they needed. Back in the old days it was called "honing. "

Many makers today tend to like to make thick blades, sometimes 1/4 inch thick or more. A lot of times the bottom of the primary grind is still very thick, and so to achieve good cutting geometry they might follow the primary grind with a high (1/8 inch or more) sabre or convex secondary grind. On the sabre grinds especially, those secondary bevels are at a particular angle (15-20 degrees depending on purpose of the knife). So, there are a variety of gizmos out there to make sure people sharpen at the proper angle to maintain maximum sharpness with that grind. That could be ceramic sticks set in a base, Lansky style sharpeners, or even gizmos that you clamp to your blade to maintain a particular angle against the abrasive block. If that secondary bevel is a convex grind, then those edges really need to be stropped like the old straight razor. The traditional means of sharpening those edges was to sweep the edge of the blade against a hard flat oilstone, but today people use sandpaper taped to a mousepad or slack belts on a benchtop belt sander.

So why is it such a big deal to sharpen knives today compared to 50 years ago? If sharpening (honing) by hand with a stone, it is next to impossible to maintain the same angle between stone and blade over the entire length of the blade. Woodworkers and machinists with years of practice can likely do it more often than not. When sharpening the old knives with thin stock and very short secondary bevels, maintaining the same angle wasn't that critical because the edge was so short (the thin silver line). When sharpening a knife made from thick stock with a high secondary bevel/edge, there is more surface to hone and therefore maintaining the correct angle (on the sabre grind) is more critical. On those high secondary sabre grinds, if you don't maintain the angle one consequence is that you could end up rounding that flat, and possibly inadvertently creating a convex edge. On the convex edge (intentionally convexed, that is) the mistake often made is to lift the blade too high when making the sweep acros the stone (or against the slack belt on your sander). So, the person grinds away the edge (where the two sides of the secondary bevel meet) rather than grinding the secondary bevel to form the fine edge.

So what went wrong on your knife? If I recall you were hand filing your blades. Unless you are really good with a file, or using a jig that limits movement in your file, your primary bevel could be more convex than flat. Try checking your primary bevel with a good straight edge to see if they are indeed flat. If your primary bevel is flat (or convex for that matter) you are likely not grinding high enough for the thickness of stock with which you are working (I did the same thing on my first knives). You corrected that on the first knife you posted. My guess is that, when trying to sharpen on the slack belt of your sander, you maintained too large of an angle (blade was more toward perpendicular to the belt than it should have been) and you ground off the edge. Are you grinding edge down or edge up? When grinding edge down to sharpen (like in some of the Youtube videos) if you push too hard into the slack belt the belt wraps around a little too much. You want it to wrap around the edge a little to form the convex surface. But, you want that belt to exit the blade at such an angle that it FORMS the edge where the left and right bevels meet. If you press too hard the belt wraps around and actually removes that edge, rounding it. It takes practice to master that method of sharpening--you need to get the angle between blade and belt just right and you need the same amount of pressure along the blade AND ON BOTH SIDES OF THE BLADE. (Did you ever notice a point where your knife seemed sharp cutting right to left but not left to right?) And of course there is the entire friction/pressure/heat issue that you discovered.
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  #10  
Old 10-12-2008, 09:25 AM
AcridSaint AcridSaint is offline
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The paper wheels are OK, but the gritted wheel doesn't stay gritted long. The slotted wheel will last forever and doesn't need to be re-gritted. I sharpen on a contact wheel with a belt and then a stiff buff. works better for me and I can get more use out of a used belt.

As long as you're slow and careful you shouldn't ruin any blades. There should be one consistent pass and take it off to look at your angle. If you think you're getting it hot with each pass then dip it in water.


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  #11  
Old 10-12-2008, 09:58 AM
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Shankmaker Shankmaker is offline
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Thanks for the link and info.
One of the reasons I started this thread is because I was curious if particular grinds have a certain way to sharpen the edge.
Im not sure what kind of grind im doing. Im trying the flat grind with a file but I havent been starting it from the spine. I have been cheating it down a little. Maybe im leaving too much steel from the grind line to the edge?


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  #12  
Old 10-12-2008, 11:15 AM
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Alan L Alan L is offline
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You're doing a sort of modified sabre grind. Nothing wrong with that, but I think you'd be happier with a full flat grind. MUCH easier to get crisp lines when you've only got one to worry about!

I use a combination of stones and the "scary sharp" method, starting on a Norton combination oil stone, then to an ancient translucent hard oil stone, then to 3m honing film. This is just very fine sandpaper on a self-adhesive plastic backing, comes in grit sizes of 15 micron (starting), 3 micron, and finally 0.1 micron, which feels slick but will leave an absolute mirror-shiny edge. I stick it on a piece of granite countertop and have at it. All this is followed by a quick strop on smooth leather rubbed with white diamond buffing compound. The hair on your arm will literally jump out of your skin before you even feel the edge touch anything.
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  #13  
Old 10-12-2008, 03:19 PM
chris moore chris moore is offline
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with all the super complicated answers there are and the endless ways to do it i have one way. a $5 broadhead sharpener from academy. i can get a razor edge in a bout 15 seconds
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  #14  
Old 10-12-2008, 06:37 PM
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Shankmaker Shankmaker is offline
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Well I finally got an edge on the knife. The lansky would not work because I couldnt get the angle I needed. I ended up drilling another slot in the rod holder of the lansky so I could get the angle I needed.

Thanks for all the replies and tips.
Again I see there is more then one way to skin a cat.


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  #15  
Old 10-13-2008, 08:12 AM
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Spyerco Triangle system is popular also.

Dave
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